IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v3y2012i1d10.1038_ncomms2012.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

In situ measurement of exciton energy in hybrid singlet-fission solar cells

Author

Listed:
  • Bruno Ehrler

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

  • Brian J. Walker

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

  • Marcus L. Böhm

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

  • Mark W.B. Wilson

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

  • Yana Vaynzof

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

  • Richard H. Friend

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

  • Neil C. Greenham

    (Cavendish Laboratory, J.J. Thomson Avenue, University of Cambridge)

Abstract

Singlet exciton fission-sensitized solar cells have the potential to exceed the Shockley–Queisser limit by generating additional photocurrent from high-energy photons. Pentacene is an organic semiconductor that undergoes efficient singlet fission—the conversion of singlet excitons into pairs of triplets. However, the pentacene triplet is non-emissive, and uncertainty regarding its energy has hindered device design. Here we present an in situ measurement of the pentacene triplet energy by fabricating a series of bilayer solar cells with infrared-absorbing nanocrystals of varying bandgaps. We show that the pentacene triplet energy is at least 0.85 eV and at most 1.00 eV in operating devices. Our devices generate photocurrent from triplets, and achieve external quantum efficiencies up to 80%, and power conversion efficiencies of 4.7%. This establishes the general use of nanocrystal size series to measure the energy of non-emissive excited states, and suggests that fission-sensitized solar cells are a favourable candidate for third-generation photovoltaics.

Suggested Citation

  • Bruno Ehrler & Brian J. Walker & Marcus L. Böhm & Mark W.B. Wilson & Yana Vaynzof & Richard H. Friend & Neil C. Greenham, 2012. "In situ measurement of exciton energy in hybrid singlet-fission solar cells," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 3(1), pages 1-6, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:3:y:2012:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms2012
    DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2012
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms2012
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/ncomms2012?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhendong Li & Federico J. Hernández & Christian Salguero & Steven A. Lopez & Rachel Crespo-Otero & Jingbai Li, 2025. "Machine learning photodynamics decode multiple singlet fission channels in pentacene crystal," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 16(1), pages 1-10, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:3:y:2012:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms2012. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.